Treasury’s Primary Record Names a Secretary General; Cairo Reporting Says Two Men Claim the Top Job
The Files noted on Tuesday that no primary record confirmed July’s Brotherhood fundraising sanctions. The record exists — and it raises a question about organisational structure that no English-language coverage has engaged.
Treasury’s press release sb0572 and OFAC’s recent-actions entry, both dated 23 July, designated seven targets — four individuals and three entities — for material support to Hamas under Executive Order 13224, as amended. The named individual is Mahmoud al-Abyari, described by OFAC as a United Kingdom-based senior leader of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood and Secretary General of the Muslim Brotherhood General Secretariat, who Treasury says supported fundraising for Filistin Vakfi and Hayat Yolu, both previously sanctioned over Hamas ties. Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent: “The Trump Administration will relentlessly pursue terrorists and those who finance them.” State Department spokesperson Tommy Pigott described the network’s method as “charitable facades and underground networks to disguise and move funds in support of terrorism.” Secondary reporting names Tujah Bulah Global in Indonesia and Madad Palestine Charitable Society in Gaza; The National reports Treasury said Madad funds were collected ostensibly for civilians and diverted for military purposes. GB News alone describes al-Abyari as an Egyptian-Austrian dual national in London.
Asharq Al-Awsat’s on-the-record read came from Mounir Adib, an expert on extremist groups, who argued the designation matters because al-Abyari is secretary-general of the Brotherhood’s international organisation — which Adib calls its highest governing body — and oversees its global financial network, funding being the backbone of the group’s activity. That premise is where the unresolved question sits. The Egyptian outlet Manassa reports the movement currently has two men each claiming the title of acting General Guide, and that Mahmoud Hussein issued a statement on 20 June, the anniversary of Mohamed Morsi’s death, under a heading to the effect of “Our vision: one group.” If the organisation is split, designating the Secretary General of the General Secretariat may bite one faction’s apparatus and leave the other’s intact. None of the retrieved English-language coverage addresses which it is.
Assessment: Sanctions are only as strong as the org chart they assume. The 23 July action is documented, multi-jurisdictional and credited to three US agencies — and its practical reach still depends on a fact nobody in Washington or Cairo has established on the record: whether the General Secretariat is the movement’s operative centre or one claimant’s structure. Treat Adib’s “highest governing body” framing as a working hypothesis, not a finding. The highest-leverage gap remains British: al-Abyari lives in the UK, where a proscription review was reported in late 2025 through second-hand Arabic renderings of a Downing Street line. Whether London has taken any parallel financial action against him is unknown.